Elvis

Lips in Defilade

By: Fred Marchant - Jan 18, 2016

Elvis

There is pleasure in art, he tells us, but there is so much more.
There are, for example, lips, vast legions of lips. Lips in phalanx,

lips in defilade, the lips of encirclement. The lips of full frontal assault,
the lips of aerial bombardment, and sad collateral damage, the imperial

lip in purple majesty. Lips on parade, platoons of lips, marching lips,
lips dropping out of the sky landing on the lip of the battlement, secrets

slipping from loosened lips, little lips like fires burning on a hillside
before the morning's battle, sparks of juniper leaping into the heavens

where the stars include the King in his armor, curling his lip famously,
flanked by great Caesars of the bright light city and the soul of fire

 as if their bursts were two lips and he the song dwelling in that mouth.